The Hall Monitor
I’ll admit something.
For much of my life, I was a closet Hall Monitor.
One time my wife and I were downtown on a date. We came to a city street that needed crossing. Without hesitation, she stepped off the curb and started walking straight across — right in the middle of the block!
No crosswalk.
No blinking sign.
Just an empty street.
I stopped.
I stared at her in disbelief… maybe even mild contempt… then glanced down the block toward the clearly marked crosswalk like it was a sacred destination.
I started walking toward the crosswalk.
She stood halfway across the empty street looking at me like I was the crazy one.
I hesitated.
Then — in what felt like a dramatic moral collapse — I committed the grave sin of jaywalking.
It was almost as if I was releasing some inner “bad boy” that had been buried deep within me.
Silly, I know.
But the drive to follow the rules was so ingrained in me that even something as simple — and common — as crossing an empty street mid-block created anxiety.
That’s how deeply I believed in the rules.
I understood them.
I applied them.
I operated inside them.
And if I’m being honest… the rules gave me a sense of control.
If everyone simply followed the guidelines, things would work.
If we all stayed inside the lines, there would be order.
Predictability.
Stability.
Then I discovered something frustrating:
Not everyone follows the rules.
That realization used to anger me. I couldn’t understand it.
Why wouldn’t someone operate within the system that clearly works?
But maturity — and leadership — has a way of humbling you.
The Shift
As I stepped into leadership (often feeling like an imposter along the way), I learned something far more powerful than rule-following:
We get to write the rules.
In our organizations.
In our teams.
In our families.
We are not prisoners to “the way it’s always been done.”
And even more freeing than that?
We can change the rulebook when it no longer produces what it was intended to produce.
But here’s the catch.
If rules are written from ego, fear, or control… they eventually collapse.
If rules are written from frustration… they become weapons.
If rules are written to compensate for insecurity… they suffocate the very people they were meant to guide.
What Governs the Rulebook?
Wisdom has taught me this:
Rules must be governed by values.
Not preferences.
Not moods.
Not reactions.
Values define who we are.
Rules define how we operate.
Rules shouldn’t be a prison.
They should be a guide.
When your rules flow from your values, something powerful happens:
Accountability feels fair.
Expectations feel clear.
Discipline feels consistent.
Change feels purposeful instead of chaotic.
The beauty of leadership is not enforcing someone else’s system.
It is building a system that reflects your identity.
A Question for the Roundtable
Are the rules in your organization governed by clear values…
Or by reaction?
If you had to rewrite your rulebook tomorrow, what values would guide it?
Because here’s the truth:
You are already writing the rules — whether you mean to or not.
The only question is whether they are aligned with who you say you are.
Build Your Rulebook Intentionally
If you’ve never taken the time to clearly define the values that govern your leadership — now is the time.
Because if you don’t define them intentionally, your rules will be written by habit, pressure, or reaction.
And that’s not leadership. That’s drift.
If you’d like help clarifying the values that should guide your rulebook, I created a free resource to walk you through that process.
You can download the Leadership Identity Blueprint here:
👉 Get the Free Leadership Identity Blueprint here.
Define who you are.
Then build the rules from there.